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The Chrysalids

3.89 of 5 stars 3.89 · rating details · 14,031 ratings · 678 reviews

The Chrysalids is set in the future after a devastating global nuclear war. David, the young hero of the novel, lives in a tight-knit community of religious and genetic fundamentalists, who exist in a state of constant alert for any deviation from what they perceive as the norm of God's creation, deviations broadly classified as 'offenses' and 'blasphemies.' Offenses consi...more

Mass Market Paperback, 200 pages

Published June 28th 1977 by Penguin Books (first published 1955)

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Oct 21, 2009 Shannon (Giraffe Days) rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: sci-fi, apocalyptic-or-post-apocalyptic, favourite, 2007, dystopian

This has been on my shelf, unread, since uni, when I picked it up second-hand after reading and loving The Day of the Triffids, recommended to me by my mum. I can't believe I waited so long to read this amazing book, and if there is one book you should read in your life it is this one.

It has been a long time - how long no one can say, though surely centuries - since God sent the Tribulation to the Old People (us), near destroying everything we had built and learned. The Tribulation continues: t...more

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Sep 07, 2009 Simon rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: sf

A post apocalyptic world in which society puritanically tries to resist the deviations that beset their crops, livestock and people through genetic mutations.

David Strorm, never quite understanding his father's fervour for normality soon discovers that he (and certain others) deviate from the norm in a new and undetectable way. As they try to keep their difference hidden and try to be normal, they eventually discover that they won't ever fit in and with the arrival of David's sister Petra, it b...more

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Sep 16, 2010 Stephanie rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction, classic

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Some two years ago, I stood in a Japanese supermarket admiring the perfectly identical produce: large, robust apples, blemish-free bananas curved to a precise degree, melons rich and ruddy and designed to fit perfectly within their packaging. One can only imagine the exacting science that goes into producing such fruit, can only imagine how much defective or inadequate produce is thrown away or recycled into some other fruit-based food—pastes and preserves, perhaps. It’s not just Japan that harb...more

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Mar 06, 2012 Rykel rated it 5 of 5 stars

This novel really surprised me. I thought I was in for another dose of boring psycho-babble but I was glad I was wrong and the more I began to read I realised I just couldn't put it down.The Characters are so interesting especially David's allies, "Michael" and "Rosalind", the novel could have been written from any of these character's Pov and it would still have been great. I loved the whole telekinesis thing and the fact that David's dad,"Joseph Strorm" was as much of a zealous (then again may...more

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Aug 28, 2012 Hannah rated it 5 of 5 stars

I read this book last year for school, and although it took me a while to really get into it, the last hundred pages or so were amazing. I really loved the idea of human mutations as a result of (what I assumed) some kind of nuclear world war. Wyndham would have been heavily influenced by the post-war times that he lived in and I thought his aptitude for understanding the ways of the human race appeared in this book profoundly. I'm obsessed with dystopian/science-fiction novels and this one is p...more

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Sep 12, 2012 Jonathan rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: classic readers

Shelves: classic-challenge, science-fiction, classic-literature, personal-favourites, fantasy-sci-fi-challenge

Having recently read John Wyndham's famous novel The Day of the Triffids, which is known more for the film adaptations, I decided to read another of Wyndham's books. The result left me very satisfied and I must conclude that Wyndham now holds a place on my (imaginary) bookshelf of favourite classic sci-fi authors alongside Wells, Asimov and Verne to name a few.

The idea of The Chrysalids is simple but executed extremely well. As a result The Chrysalids is a complement to the aesthetic as well as...more
Having recently read John Wyndham's famous novel The Day of the Triffids, which is known more for the film adaptations, I decided to read another of Wyndham's books. The result left me very satisfied and I must conclude that Wyndham now holds a place on my (imaginary) bookshelf of favourite classic sci-fi authors alongside Wells, Asimov and Verne to name a few.

The idea of The Chrysalids is simple but executed extremely well. As a result The Chrysalids is a complement to the aesthetic as well as to the mental senses of the reader. This is what I believe Wyndham excels at doing like Wells, creating compulsive and entertaining science fiction which is as readable as it is intelligent and questioning. Like all great novels this book ties to both the past, the present and the future of its readership and humanity.

The plot follows one adolescent boy, David, growing up in a kind of post-apocalyptic world where an event named 'the Tribulation' has occurred. It becomes clear that this 'Tribulation' has affected the genetic make up of the population of the world. The very name of this event reveals another side to the story, a strict legalistic form of Christian religion has formed a new kind of community. In this community mutation is intolerable, a 'deviation' from man as the 'true image' of God. Of course the protagonist David recognises the fallacy of viewing mutants as inhuman:

"Well, every part of a definition is as important as any other; and if a child doesn't come within it, then it isn't human, and that means it doesn't have a soul. It is not the image of God, it is an imitation, and in the imitations there is always some mistake. Only God produces perfection, so although deviations may look like us in many ways, they cannot be really human. They are something quite different."
I thought that over.
"But Sophie isn't really different - not in any other way," I told him.

As it turns out David is himself a 'deviation', one of those 'sent by the devil' to test the true images. He, and a small group of his friends in the community, can communicate via telepathy. Of course no one can tell visibly that they are 'non-human' and so they remain hidden. That is until one of their number decides to marry a deviation-hating 'norm'.

The issues this novel tackles are broad and far reaching. It is both a challenge to strict Pharisaic religion, which does not heed the true message of its source, and a tale about humanity. It questions what it is to be human: whether it is about appearance or about deeper, underlying issues. And as part of challenging what it is to be human it challenges how we alienate and accept others as alien and non-human: whether that be on race, gender, sexuality, religion, age or so on. The voice of the narrator, the protagonist is perfect for allowing the writer to speak on these issues. Take the following quote for example:
"'Oh,' I said, vaguely but safely. It was odd, I felt, how many people seemed to have positive, if conflicting, information upon God's views."

Ultimately though this book was written years ago I believe it applies to today as an excellent novel we can learn from. I would encourage anyone to make sure that they read this book at least once. It may not necessarily be the best written of John Wyndham's books but it is one that challenges issues still relevant to our present and future.(less)

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Feb 23, 2013 David Sarkies rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: sci-fi

I remember when I bought this book somebody said to me that it was brilliant. Having now read it (and it only took me the first ten pages to realise it) I must wholeheartedly agree with him. This is indeed a brilliant book. As I read it, it reminded me a lot of 'The Day of the Triffids' and my hunch was correct that it indeed was written by the same author.
This book is set far into the future. The world has been destroyed by nuclear war (we assume, though it is never actually spelled out) and t...more I remember when I bought this book somebody said to me that it was brilliant. Having now read it (and it only took me the first ten pages to realise it) I must wholeheartedly agree with him. This is indeed a brilliant book. As I read it, it reminded me a lot of 'The Day of the Triffids' and my hunch was correct that it indeed was written by the same author.
This book is set far into the future. The world has been destroyed by nuclear war (we assume, though it is never actually spelled out) and the setting is a small collection of villages on the island of Labrador. The village is inhabited by humans who believe that they are the true image of God. The reason for this is that we are told that only two books survive from the old time, the Bible and an interpretation of the bible called Repentances. It is from Repentances that the belief of the villagers about the true form comes. They believes that unless one has the form of a human as we know it, then they are cursed and are cast out of the village to live on the fringe. An animal that is deemed to be deviant (as well as crops) are automatically destroyed. However, it is only the obvious defects that are usually found out because the hero of the book (David) and a group of his friends have the power of telepathy, however they quickly learn that they must keep this ability a closely guarded secret.
The introduction to this book compared it with 1984 in that it is really a criticism of British society at the time of writing (1984 is an anagram of 1948, the year the book was written). It is sad that science fiction and fantasy have degenerated to the pulp rubbish that it is today, however there is still a lot of quality writing available. The Chrysalids is about change and societies resistance to it. It is interesting that looking back at the 50's we do not see the problems that are raised in the book, and the only fear that I know of was the fear of communism. However it is difficult to link communism with the mutants in the Chrysalids. Further, it is difficult to picture a church as powerful in the 50's as it was in the book. However, it is possible that the idea is that the church in the book represents the government, and that the mutants represent thinking and belief that is in opposition to the government of the day. While people were not killed or exiled for differing beliefs, the red scare did lead to a lot of needless persecutions (which is similar to Arthur Miller's The Crucible, which, while set in Salem during the witch hunts, was reflective of the communist purges of his times). However, the Chrysalids is not able people being accused for ulterior motivies, but rather a fear of change and the unknown, and those who show difference are hated. Even more so, where the telephaths (or, as I believe, the Chrysalids) are concerned, they are feared intensely because the norms simply cannot know who they are.(less)

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Dec 12, 2009 Dan Schwent rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: early-sf

The Chrysalids is my new favorite John Wyndham book. It's about conformity in a post-nuclear holocaust world. David and his friends live in an isolated community called Waknuk on the island of Labrador. After seeing one of his friends cast out into the Fringes for having a sixth toe, David begins mistrusting his upbringing. Once he discovers that he and a small group of his friends are telepathic, things only get worse.

Wyndham draws on the paranoia and distrust of the deviations from the norm th...more

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Feb 16, 2010 Jen rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Loved, loved, loved this book! Post-apocalyptic dystopia, religious fanatics, what's not to love?

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Feb 28, 2009 Chris F rated it 1 of 5 stars Recommends it for: anyone who would like a very obvious example of wolf in sheep's clothing manipulative techniques

At first it seems as if John Wyndham is making the point that those with physical deformities are humans just like everyone else, and should be treated as such. However if we divide this book into heroes and villains, and weigh up the pros and cons for each group we find that the “heroes” are the greater monsters. If the villains are defined by their intolerance of anyone or anything that deviates from the norm then our band of heroes, and their ultimate savior, are the worst offenders. I was le...more

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Feb 03, 2009 Richard rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The Chrysalids is a great science fiction story that has a lot of relevence to our current society (as most good science fiction does) and also happens to be a bit of a page turner. Set in a post-apocalyptic future that is only just starting to recover from a bad case of global warming and nuclear fallout, the story concerns a boy growing up in a strict pre-industrial fundamentalist Christian society that's just barely keeping it together. The religion is based around two books - the bible, the...more

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May 01, 2013 Rob Bliss rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is seriously good!

It's on par with 1984 and Animal Farm and Lord of the Flies and should be taught in schools (maybe it is, some high schools not run by idiots like at my high school). It is sci-fi and fantasy as much as Orwell is, but Orwell is takenb seriously, and this is maybe just seen as a young teen book or something.

Curriculums need to rediscover this book. Its about 200 pages, so dont worry you wont strain yourself. And it'll teach so much in so few pages. Amazing how much Wyndha...more

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Mar 20, 2013 Holly Driver rated it 5 of 5 stars

I read this on a train journey a couple of days ago. Sci-fi isn't what I usually read, however as a child I read The Day Of The Triffids and loved it, so I thought I'd give this a go. Love the social commentary and the characters, the pacing of the plot is so good you forget you're reading. I've read some criticisms of the ending, - SPOILERS SPOILERS - saying that John Wyndham basically undid the message the book carried that intolerance was narrow minded and divided the community, seeing as the...more

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Mar 18, 2013 Beatrice rated it 2 of 5 stars

I have just studied this book in school.

And while I found the concept of a group of telepaths forced to hide their gift from a disapproving society interesting, I found that it was not executed as well as I would have liked.

The pace of the book is somewhat of a drag and is very scattered. The pace can be very fast and then all of a sudden 6 years have passed. Sometimes the wording is a bit confusing and I will have to go back and reread (mostly when U. Axel was giving one of his long speeches)....more

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Mar 09, 2013 Sarah rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Loved it - I find dystopian future novels fascinating anyway, and this one was another great read, very fast-paced and entertaining.

However. As usual I have a few complaints.

1. Ending paragraphs with ellipses....
Melodramatic and irritating.

2. At various times certain characters would expound things about the world (or their view of it) in huge long spiels that went for pages. It's a very clunky exposition style that could've been woven in more skillfully.

3. The ending was a bit weird. I didn't...more

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Mar 07, 2013 Mary rated it 4 of 5 stars

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Pure Social Darwinism.

That's what Wyndham presents us with here. I skimmed through this book after having read and enjoyed it as a teenager - interestingly, the most vivid part, both on my first and second read, was the beginning. Young David's friendship with Sophie, a little girl with a minor mutation, and his dawning awareness of the flaws and hypocrisy of his society, were compelling. I began to lose interest after his little sister was born.

I said I read and enjoyed this as a teenager. I d...more Pure Social Darwinism.

That's what Wyndham presents us with here. I skimmed through this book after having read and enjoyed it as a teenager - interestingly, the most vivid part, both on my first and second read, was the beginning. Young David's friendship with Sophie, a little girl with a minor mutation, and his dawning awareness of the flaws and hypocrisy of his society, were compelling. I began to lose interest after his little sister was born.

I said I read and enjoyed this as a teenager. I didn't love it, and I don't think it influenced me at all, as other books have done. Wyndham's vision is pretty consistently bleak. He tells stories that show the evils of fundamentalism, and the failure of societies to cope with disasters. Which means that his books ought to be popular now! They are, if you like, proto-dystopians.

"The Chrysalids" is interesting because, in a way, it's the flip side of another of his books, "The Midwich Cuckoos" (made famous as the black and white horror/sf classic, "Village of the Damned".) David, the protagonist, living in a bleak, fundamentalist community long after a nuclear holocaust, is one of the cuckoos. This time, the mutants win. Spoilers ahead-

David, his little sister, and several other young people from his community are mutants. In their community, mutations are considered ungodly blasphemies, and are either destroyed or sterilized. Fortunately for David and his friends and sister, they look perfectly normal physically, which is how they've been able to "pass". Instead, their mutation is mental; all of them can communicate mind to mind. After a dangerous and painful escape to the Fringes, where mutants live apart from the "pure", normal people, a battle breaks out. The "pure", led by David's father, are attacking the Fringe dwellers. At this point, towards the end of the book, David and his fellow telepaths are rescued by citizens of the city he's dreamed of all his life. They, like him, are telepaths, super men and women. In order to rescue the young people, they kill every single survivor of the battle. All the animals, too. To the "advanced", mutated telepaths, these creatures - these people - are evolutionary failures, mere vermin to be eradicated. I don't know about you, but I think that's awful. The highest and most human people in the book are Sophie's parents and David's Uncle Axel. That's because they have a concept of love and compassion. Sophie's father doesn't kill the little boy who threatens his little girl with discovery. Sophie's mother becomes a second mother to David. Uncle Axel keeps his secret for years, gives him hope, and presents a nuanced view of the world. Compared to them, I found the telepathic rescuers to be utterly horrifying.

So - it's a good book, but not one I'd reread a second time. The story is gripping for much of its length, and it does raise some interesting questions. The style is clear and readable, though a modern teen might find it slow. Summing up, I didn't actually like the book on a second reading, and I'm not sure I liked it as a teen. But I'm not sorry I bought it for the teen room. Like Wyndham's other books, it's a classic for a reason. But it makes me want to argue passionately with the author! Maybe that's not a bad thing.(less)

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Mar 06, 2013 Clara Madden rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I was assigned this book through my Virtual High School English course, so of course I was looking forward to the Novel Quiz because I love to read. I sort of lost interest because according to Amazon reviews, my Aunt, my cousin, and my brother, it was "too weird" or "too boring". A lot of people hated it. I was expecting for the worst...

I absolutely LOVED it! It was one of my favourite books I have ever read and I've read a lot of books! I was so pleased! I loved the writing, the characters, an...more I was assigned this book through my Virtual High School English course, so of course I was looking forward to the Novel Quiz because I love to read. I sort of lost interest because according to Amazon reviews, my Aunt, my cousin, and my brother, it was "too weird" or "too boring". A lot of people hated it. I was expecting for the worst...

I absolutely LOVED it! It was one of my favourite books I have ever read and I've read a lot of books! I was so pleased! I loved the writing, the characters, and the plot. I would have given it a fifth star instead of four but it was really frustrating at times. Oh well, just goes to show you that you're enjoying it if you feel for the characters!

"The Chrysalids" is about a post-holocaust community that thrives on one thing: the "True Image" set by God. If you do not have two arms, two legs, two feet, two hands, ten toes, ten fingers, and features that makes us our sex, you are considered a "deviant": a child created by the devil. If a child is born with a simple blemish of the body they are taken away towards the Fringes, a cold, dark community where outcasts live. The babies simply die once they are dumped in the middle of nowhere or they are taken in by the people of the Fringes. If a woman bears three children with a "deviation" she can be kicked out of the house by her own husband who will then seek for a wife that will give him "proper" children. (Geez, did the men ever think that it was maybe THEIR fault something was wrong with the baby? They helped create them!) If someone finds out that a woman has a deviation later in her life, she is sterilized.

(Pretty harsh, eh?)

David is the main character and he has telepathy. So do a few of his friends. They all talk through each other's minds and they send out "thought shapes" to express their emotions or to describe something they are seeing. While they see many "deviants" banished or killed, they struggle to keep their secrets hidden. For obvious reasons.

I highly recommend this book. I'll admit, it does drop into the Science Fiction genre so it might be "too weird" for some people who read it. But who doesn't love a good story?!

(less)

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Mar 03, 2013 Marion Stein rated it 5 of 5 stars

Joy is rediscovering a book you read in childhood, and still loving it.

I first read Rebirth (the original US title of The Chrysalids) when I was a child and probably didn’t get most of the references. I understood the future post-apocalypse part, having already absorbed Twilight Zone reruns and The Outer Limits. Horror movies had made me aware that nuclear attacks could lead to mutations, long before I learned it any science class. I don’t know if I would have made any analogies between the fund...more Joy is rediscovering a book you read in childhood, and still loving it.

I first read Rebirth (the original US title of The Chrysalids) when I was a child and probably didn’t get most of the references. I understood the future post-apocalypse part, having already absorbed Twilight Zone reruns and The Outer Limits. Horror movies had made me aware that nuclear attacks could lead to mutations, long before I learned it any science class. I don’t know if I would have made any analogies between the fundamentalists in the story and real life fundies as I wasn’t exposed to a lot of ultra-religious types.

Because the protagonists are young, this is a tale that would probably today be considered “young adult” although it’s a story anyone can enjoy, and everyone should read. I wonder if teenagers today, reared on The Hunger Games would like it. They might. The young people in Rebirth are also being in endangered by their society. They aren’t wizards, but like Harry Potter and his friends, they aren’t exactly muggles either.

The setting is someplace in Labrador, which still retains a few familiar place names. (Newfoundland is Newf, for instance). It’s warmer than now, presumably not because of greenhouse gases but because of something to do with the “Tribulations” that destroyed the civilization of “the old people.” The technology is similar to the early 19th century. The horseless carriage hasn’t been reinvented yet, nor are there railroads, and everyone is obsessed by “mutation.” Even slightly deviant plants are burnt, and animals slaughtered but not eaten. The government may make allowances when convenient, like considering giant horses “naturally bred.” Human babies born even with minor variations such as a port-wine stain, meet a mysterious fate. It’s unclear what happens to infants when they don’t pass “inspection” although it seems likely it’s infanticide. If mutants are discovered when they’re older, they are sterilized and exiled to the “Fringes” an “uncivilized” area where life is they are unlikely to survive. Beyond the Fringes, we are told, lie lands blackened and ruined.

David Storm, our narrator and protagonist, grows up in a small community mostly of farms, in a household where his father is a fundamentalist preacher, and his mother is docile. There were other children born who didn’t make the cut, and finally a little sister who did. But David, his distant cousin Rosalyn, and a number of other children in the community are keeping a secret. They are telepaths, and understand early on that if discovered this would mean sterilization and exile. David’s sister Petra turns out to have powers way beyond the abilities of others that are clear from an even earlier age, which places the group in danger, as does young adulthood, when one of the group falls in love with a “norm” and shares their secret.

Their power seems to operate much like radio with a specific range. Petra’s range, however, is limitless and she eventually makes contacts with others in a distant land – a civilization far more advanced than the one they live in. In that place, telepathy is the norm, and those who don’t have it try to develop it, but no one so young has Petra’s powers. She’s important enough for the others to save and they attempt to do so by sending an airship (described as being blimp-like and slower than our planes). But will it come in time?

The edition I read was within a hardcover anthology, A Treasury of Great Science Fiction, Volume I, which I found once upon a time in our family room/basement. It’s also available in several other editions. As it's novella length, it's often paired with other work or anthologized.(less)

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Jan 30, 2013 Abe Something rated it 3 of 5 stars

I found this book lacked all of tension it wished to deliver. In final chapters when the action is going down it all occurs across a three different locations (the Sealand ship, Michael's position, and David's position), and the breaks between the action we experience in each area are too long and give the book a plodding quality. I felt as though, through most of this book, that I was just going through the motion of a good story, and it is a good story, it's just not told in an engaging manner...more

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Jan 20, 2013 Bibliophile rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Excellent dystopian, post-apocalyptic novel written in crystalline prose. Young David is beginning to question the fundamentalist society he lives in, where "normalcy" is the only valid state of being, and where any deviations from God's image are purged, whether a malformed potato or a child with an extra toe. David himself is secretly a telepath and hence a "blasphemy". His innate decency and struggle with his pious upbringing is skilfully depicted, and there is something very genuine and touc...more

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Aug 11, 2012 Aban (Aby) rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is about my fourth reading of "The Chrysalids" in as many decades yet, for me, the book remains a source of infinite pleasure. Set in the future after a neuclear disaster, it tells the story of young David raised in a narrow minded community, where anyone or anything deviating in the smallest way from what is considered 'the norm' is killed or exiled. The story begins when David is ten years old and befriends a little girl who he knows to be a deviant. It ends with him as a young man, in lo...more

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Jun 10, 2012 Charles Dee Mitchell rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: mid-century-sf

Centuries after a nuclear war, one remnant of humanity lives in Labrador, a country transformed by climate change and a theocratic government into England in the late Middle Ages. The setting is an affluent farming community that lives strictly by the laws set out in the Bible and a work called The Repentances. The latter work has set the program for identifying what is in the true image of God, something that could come in handy in a society that still undergoes periods of mutated births and cr...more Centuries after a nuclear war, one remnant of humanity lives in Labrador, a country transformed by climate change and a theocratic government into England in the late Middle Ages. The setting is an affluent farming community that lives strictly by the laws set out in the Bible and a work called The Repentances. The latter work has set the program for identifying what is in the true image of God, something that could come in handy in a society that still undergoes periods of mutated births and crops. These mutations are especially severe when the wind blows strongly from the south. Southwest lies The Badlands, country so scorched by radiation it remains poisonous. Since this society considers the distant war years The Tribulation and gives a primitive theological interpretation to the effects of radiation poisoning, giving birth to a mutated child is blasphemy and a judgment on the community. They burn crops that show signs of deviation. This helps keeps them healthy. They leave an infant with six toes to die of exposure or be taken in by Fringe Dwellers. This makes them easy for modern readers to judge.

John Strorm's father is successful farmer and leader in the local church. John's friendship with a six-toed girl and her family that hides her sets him on a road to questioning authority. This road is made easier to follow because each night he is in telepathic communication with his cousin on lives on an adjoining farm and a dozen other children, most of whom he has never met. He learns a bit more about the world at large from Uncle Axel who was once a sailor. His voyages have made him something of a cosmopolitan compared to the locals, but when he tells John what he has learned of the world at large, we come up against the poorest elements of Wyndham's writing. Uncle Axel's descriptions of The Fringes, The Badlands, and more distant lands where people have made lives for themselves following different ways than those laid down in The Repentances have all the liveliness of the worst narration found in the worst nature documentaries. But they make their point, something Wyndham seems unable to do without hammering it home to make sure we are getting it.

Many positive reader reviews of The Chrysalids mention reading it as a teenager. Lessons about toleration and questioning authority are always worth hearing, but those learned in adolescence remain the most vivid. For the last third of the novel, I kept telling Wyndham, OK, I get it.

But then he makes some surprising moves. The telepathic children, now young adults, are on the run from the mobs with the torches and the pitchforks -- no, wait, that's a different story. But they are on the run, in danger from both their own families and the not so broadminded Fringe People. They have made contact with an advanced group of telepaths who are flying to their rescue -- yes, flying. They have balloon like vehicles and what turn out to be pretty nasty weaponry. Like all the groups in the novels, they are fighting to protect the place in society, and they are cold blooded when it comes to fighting to the death. I was reminded Theodore Sturgeon's More Than Human, where those who represent the next step in human evolution are not anyone you would want to cross in real life. Superior beings tend to have a pretty high opinion of themselves.

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Apr 03, 2012 Travis rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is fun, fast British Sci Fi from the fifties. I thought it was interesting to read a post apocalyptic thriller born out of cold war era fears of nuclear holocaust, etc., rather than the "enviropocalypse" stuff we see more of today (Atwood's Oryx and Crake would be one example). There are some interesting parallels between the world of this book and that of the Hunger Games. The surviving civilization here is split into districts, they live a primitive lifestyle compared to that of the "old...more

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Mar 21, 2012 Donovan rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: sci-fi, thriller

I dread this as a teenager and instantly felt empathy with the characters. The story carries strong social undercurrents regarding tolerance and I believe it is a good story for the younger generation to read. There are thrills and adventure throughout and some good moral questions being asked that need to be asked.
A good read.

Plot ***Spoilers***
A few thousand years in the future, post-apocalypse rural Labrador has become a warmer and more hospitable place than it is at present. The inhabitants...more I dread this as a teenager and instantly felt empathy with the characters. The story carries strong social undercurrents regarding tolerance and I believe it is a good story for the younger generation to read. There are thrills and adventure throughout and some good moral questions being asked that need to be asked.
A good read.

Plot ***Spoilers***
A few thousand years in the future, post-apocalypse rural Labrador has become a warmer and more hospitable place than it is at present. The inhabitants of Labrador have vague historical recollections of the "Old People", a technologically advanced civilization which existed long ago and which they believe was destroyed when God sent "Tribulation" to the world to punish their forebears' sins. The society that has survived in Labrador is loosely reminiscent of the American frontier during the 18th century.

The inhabitants practise a form of fundamentalist Christianity with post-apocalyptic prohibitions. They believe that in order to follow God's word and prevent another Tribulation, they need to preserve absolute normality among the surviving humans, plants and animals. Genetic invariance has been elevated to the highest religious principle, and humans with even minor mutations are considered "Blasphemies" and the handiwork of the Devil.

Individuals not conforming to a strict physical norm are either killed or sterilized and banished to the Fringes, a lawless and untamed area still rife with animal and plant mutations. Arguments occur over the keeping of a tailless cat or the possession of oversize horses. These are deemed by the government to be legitimate breeds either pre-existing or achieved through conventional breeding. The government's position is considered both cynical and heretical by the orthodox frontier community.

The inland rural settlement of Waknuk is a frontier farming community, populated with hardy and pious individuals intent on reclaiming land from the Fringes. Ten-year-old David Strorm, the son of Waknuk's zealous religious patriarch, has inexplicably vivid dreams of brightly lit cities and horseless carts that are at odds with his pre-industrial experience. Despite David's rigorous religious training, he befriends Sophie, a girl carefully concealing the fact that she has six toes on each foot. With the nonchalance of childhood David keeps her secret. The subsequent discovery of Sophie's mutation and her family's attempted flight causes David to wonder at the brutal persecution of human "Blasphemies" and the ritual culling of animal and plant "Deviations". David and a few others of his generation harbour their own invisible mutation: they have strong telepathic abilities. David begins to question why all who are different must be banished or killed.

As they mature, David and his fellow telepaths realize that their unusual mutation would be considered a "blasphemy" and they carefully conceal their abilities. That their mutation cannot be directly detected allows their unusual abilities to remain undiscovered for a time. Eventually some of the group are exposed and David, his half-cousin Rosalind and younger sister Petra flee to the Fringes. Through the unusually strong telepathic abilities of Petra they make contact with a more advanced society in distant "Sealand". David, Rosalind and Petra elude their would-be captors and are rescued by a Sealand expedition sent to discover the source of Petra's telepathic transmissions, while Michael, another of the Waknuk telepaths, travels back to Waknuk for Rachel, another telepath.

Though the nature of "Tribulation" is not explicitly stated, it is implied that it was a nuclear holocaust, both by the mutations, and by the stories of sailors who report blackened, glassy wastes to the south-west where the remains of faintly glowing cities can be seen (presumably the east coast of the US). Sailors venturing too close to these ruins experience symptoms consistent with radiation sickness. A woman from Sealand, a character with evident knowledge of the Old People's technology, mentions "the power of gods in the hands of children".(less)

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Feb 11, 2012 Melanie rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

SPOILER ALERT!!
I thought that this book was very creative, interesting, realistic, and, surprisingly, addressed some profound issues and events very likely to actually happen in the future, which is quite remarkable considering the fact that this book is quite old now.
It's not the best in terms of developed characters, but David is a strong enough protagonist, with a interesting, realistic narrative style, although some of the supporting characters fall rather flat. For example, Rosalind. I'm re...more SPOILER ALERT!!
I thought that this book was very creative, interesting, realistic, and, surprisingly, addressed some profound issues and events very likely to actually happen in the future, which is quite remarkable considering the fact that this book is quite old now.
It's not the best in terms of developed characters, but David is a strong enough protagonist, with a interesting, realistic narrative style, although some of the supporting characters fall rather flat. For example, Rosalind. I'm really not sure why I didn't like her, but I just feel like David's explanation of "having many layers" was rather boring and cliché. The plot is very original, and some of the ideas, especially about David's super-religious society and the way the interpret the Bible, seemed very realistic and it was an interesting experience to read.
However, the one thing I disliked was the ending. Yes, I get that they've finally arrived at the city, where they don't need to be shunned or in hiding, but that seeemed so anticlimactic. John Wyndham had this huge, amazing, foundation of a very believable story, and he abruptly just goes deus ex machina on us and drops a random spaceship that just comes along, kills everyone by "freezing" them for a barely valid reason, including Sophie, who was actually one of my favourite characters, without sparing a thought, and the spaceship rescues David and co., then leaves and they live happily ever after in a beautiful city.
I was hoping for so much MORE. Perhaps, that David and his friends create a rebellion against the grossly unfair interpretation of the Bible their society has, that they somehow change the world's views for the better. I was hoping for something climatic of moral importance, not just this fairy tale where they just leave their troubles behind. Also, the Sealand people seemed way too arrogant in their own powers, and held their own type of prejudice and unfairness against the non-telepathic people. The way the Sealand lady talked...it was as if she believed everything could be solved by them, and that non-telepathic people were little better than savages, much beneath her. It's the kind of beliefs that led to the nuclear disaster in the first place!
Although I liked so much of this book, I was left very unsatisfied with the ending. Still, it's an interesting read!(less)

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Nov 09, 2011 Jam rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: favorites, science-fiction

This is one of the best post-dystopic, science-fiction books I've ever read.

Written in 1955 by John Wyndham, the Chrysalids is set in a world where men have become heavily religious, focusing their religious paranoia on the idea of a "true shape", i.e. two hands, two feet, 5 fingers on each hand, 5 toes on each foot, etc, and where this religious paranoia makes them violent to anything outside it. This is a post-dystopic world where mutants abound, no doubt a result of some global nuclear fall-o...more This is one of the best post-dystopic, science-fiction books I've ever read.

Written in 1955 by John Wyndham, the Chrysalids is set in a world where men have become heavily religious, focusing their religious paranoia on the idea of a "true shape", i.e. two hands, two feet, 5 fingers on each hand, 5 toes on each foot, etc, and where this religious paranoia makes them violent to anything outside it. This is a post-dystopic world where mutants abound, no doubt a result of some global nuclear fall-out. The paranoia, then, stems from some human instinct for survival, a paranoia fueled by religion.

But despite the setting and the dogma, this isn't a heavy book to read. It comes from the viewpoint of a child, and changes as the child grows into a man. Gradually, we come to understand the confusion of why physical deformities make us "not belong". As this idea is incomprehensible to a child, thus, it is incomprehensible to us. But as the child grows older, we see how he gradually understands how even small deformities of an extra toe can incite heavy violent rejection from people who believe themselves "normal" or are of the "true shape" as they say.

The bent of the book, from being introspective on societal values and norms, becomes different, however, in the later chapters. We come to realize that the small forebodings we had of a difference in the child from who's eyes we saw, actually came from his psychic leanings. This child, along with eight others, was different not in his physical make-up, but in his mental one. The hidden knowledge of being psychic was revealed in his teenage years, which resulted in an uproar among his town, resulting in a run-and-chase scene that turns the book from being introspective, to being tritely adventuresome.

We run with the grown-child, a teenager now, his sister, and his love (all three are psychic), jarred from our quiet musings. It's quite an exertion at this point, as the quiet town turns into a regular pitch-fork mob. But there is salvation, for his sister, a psychic like no other, has made contact with some unknown mind on the other side of the world, a mind that promises them rescue and safety from religious irrationality.

From this point on, the story turns predictable in how it will end. They shall be rescued. They shall be given Eden. A good life. Amen.

But, discounting the superficial, what is the core? It is a story of prejudice. The religion, by itself, is not bad, it is how man turns into his own device, that religion. This book strikes at the prejudice that is still in us humans today. Shall we always be this way? Or will we ever grow out of it?

I, personally, do not think we shall ever avoid such prejudice. The mind is irrational because we humans are irrational. If we were not irrational, we would be no more than robots, a logical computer in a human shape. Every man is a prejudiced human. Whether he experiences prejudice, or exudes it, it cannot be escaped. Prejudice by race, gender, social class, etc. It's everywhere. Give me one human who says he's not prejudiced, and I'll give you a liar. He may not be aware of it, but that just makes him an ignorant liar, doesn't it?

Cheers, my fellow flawed human beings!(less)

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May 28, 2011 Sarah rated it 2 of 5 stars

Read this in high school. Other than just being raised to accept people the way they are, I think this book is a large part of why I can't stand discrimination.
It's sort of like X-men...if you're a mutant you're different & people are scared of you. But the example I remember from the Chrysalids was having an extra toe. Yep. 6 toes on each foot. If you didn't fit the physical norm, the various authorities in this book were so terrified of another catastrophic event occurring that they would...more

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Dec 01, 2010 Wynnie rated it 4 of 5 stars

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Written in the first person, The Chrysalids accounts for David Strorm's realisation and implications of his telepathic abilities in a tightly knit agrarian society where the slightest differences are punished and banished in the quest to distill Purity. The overarching theme for me is the definition of Man. Man as defined by David's puritanical and fundamentalist society begins with outlining outward appearances and continues to imply anything "deviant". This definition is contested as the reade...more

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Aug 17, 2010 Parksy rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: young-adult-childrens, sci-fi-fantasy

CLASSIC! - read it again in November 2007 and couldn't put it down!

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It is some time hundreds, or perhaps thousands, of years after an atomic war shattered civilization and left large parts of the world uninhabitable. Among the rural people of what used to be Newfoundland, the danger of mutation has led to a strict and ruthless definition of what constitutes humanity. Any deviation from the norm is considered an abomination. If livestock, it is slaughtered. Humans are banished to the barbarou...more CLASSIC! - read it again in November 2007 and couldn't put it down!

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It is some time hundreds, or perhaps thousands, of years after an atomic war shattered civilization and left large parts of the world uninhabitable. Among the rural people of what used to be Newfoundland, the danger of mutation has led to a strict and ruthless definition of what constitutes humanity. Any deviation from the norm is considered an abomination. If livestock, it is slaughtered. Humans are banished to the barbarous lands known as the Fringes.

David Strorm is a young boy being raised by a religious-zealot father who takes the commandments against mutation even more seriously than his society requires. Dad is such a meanie that when his sister-in-law appears, begging for the life of a baby whose mutation she considers slight, he banishes her from his sight with a loud ringing sermon about her wickedness. David, a secret telepath who shares thought-communication with several others his own age, knows his survival depends on his father never being allowed to find out what he is.

One day in early childhood, David meets a young girl named Sophie, and discovers she's hiding an extra toe. He likes her, so he promises to keep her secret. Her fate provides him a stern warning about what might be his own.

Then his younger sister Petra is born—and she has a mutation so powerful it endangers David and his telepath friends ...
A primal tale made rich in the telling

A child growing up in a repressive, unloving family discovers that he has powers that make him special, powers that the normal people who oppress him refuse to tolerate or understand. He finds a new home among people as special as himself, who take him away from his unhappy past into a place where he can be appreciated and loved.

It's a basic plot outline which has long proven irresistible to readers of fantasy and science fiction, as it speaks with such eloquence to the inner (and sometimes outer) geek in all of us. It drives Harry Potter, it drives the X-Men, and it has driven any number of other stories, by authors throughout the history of the field, about children who find out they are secretly royalty or extraterrestrials or the next stage in Mankind's evolution. There wasn't anything startling about it even in 1955, when Wyndham wrote this slim but evocative novel.

The poetry was of course in the details. Wyndham was never a writer of grand innovative ideas; his other novels include a thriller about an island infested with spiders, and another about an invasion by carnivorous trees, ideas so hackneyed on the face of them that plot synopses make his work sound as pedestrian as science fiction ever gets. Wyndham's skill lay in taking such ideas and treating them with a sobriety and a deliberate sense of pace that made them seem real on the printed page. In The Chrysalids, the friendship between the children David and Sophie, forged upon his discovery of the sixth toe that would doom her if publicly revealed, is both subtle and real. The religious fundamentalism that makes David's father such a prig may be shared by his neighbors, but even they believe him to be too much of a humorless fanatic for their tastes. And there's one marvelous, haunting scene that lodges in the memory: a mother's futile pleas for her baby, whose mutation is described only as "such a little thing," and which is never revealed to either David or the reader.

The Chrysalids grows downright unnerving in its final sections, when the rescuers from New Zealand not only massacre David's pursuers in a truly unnerving use of superior technology, but then spend a couple of pages explaining at length why this was just another justified example of evolution in action. But by that point the deus ex machina has blotted the book with ordinariness. What sticks is the portrait of a town rendered a prison by its rigid definition of humanity, and the plight of a little girl whose life depends on the concealment of an extra toe.(less)

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Jul 24, 2010 Liv rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, science-fiction

This was my first taste of old fashioned sci-fi/weirdy crack. A grad student at the WRS hooked me up with this book, shortly followed by a couple other Wyndhams. The tone that the little protagonist-narrator boy starts out using, his childish but astute understanding of the world threw me into adoration immediately. You kind-lil' kids, you silly sweethearts with stones in your shoes, embarrasment over a bloody nose, and fisticuff fits when your junior heart swells up with kinderling emotion, god...more

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About John Wyndham

John Wyndham Parkes Lucas Beynon Harris was the son of a barrister. After trying a number of careers, including farming, law, commercial art and advertising, he started writing short stories in 1925. After serving in the civil Service and the Army during the war, he went back to writing. Adopting the name John Wyndham, he started writing a form of science fiction that he called 'logical fantasy. A...more

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Quotes from The Chrysalids

“So you're in love with her?' she went on.

A word again ... When the minds have learnt to mingle, when no thought is wholly one's own, and each has taken too much of the other ever to be entirely himself alone; when one has reached the beginning of seeing with a single eye, loving with a single heart, enjoying with a single joy; when there can be moments of identity and nothing is separate save bodies that long for one another ... When there is that, where is the word? There is only the inadequacy of the word that exists.

'We love one another,' I said.” — 14 people liked it

“I shall pray to God to send charity to this hideous world, and sympathy for the weak, and love for the unhappy and unfortunate. I shall ask Him if is indeed His will that a child should suffer and its soul be damned for a little blemish on the body....And I shall pray Him, too, that the hearts of the self-righteous may be broken... ” — 9 people liked it

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